Tuesday, 30 October 2012

Matias Duarte answers some of the nagging questions the community had!

There was a couple of key complaints which Google has faced in the recent versions of Android and today Matias Duarte has stepped forward on Google+ to help explain Google's thinking!

The issues Matias tackled were SD card slots, or rather the lack of them on Google's Nexus devices and secondly the decision to drop the split navigation and notification bar which tablets with ICS or Honeycomb were blessed with.

Firstly, with regard to SD card slots and reluctantly we can actually see where he's coming from especially as Google is trying their best to work on usability for the average consumer, he said:

"Everybody likes the idea of having an SD card, but in reality it's just confusing for users. If you’re saving photos, videos or music, where does it go? Is it on your phone? Or on your card? Should there be a setting? Prompt everytime? What happens to the experience when you swap out the card? It’s just too complicated."

The second thing he brought up was the new navigation buttons which will grace the bottom of every tablet running Android 4.2, like Google and Samsung's new Nexus 10. The new navigation bar won't be split between notifications and navigation like the Motorola Xoom's was, instead the bar will be very much like the Nexus 7's and the status bar will be added to the top of the screen, so you'll have to pull down to see notifications!

"This new configuration is based on usability research we did on all of the different form factors and screen sizes that Android runs on. What mattered most of all was muscle memory - keeping the buttons where you expect them, no matter how you hold the device."

And just for your extra information, there's a good overview from The Verge which gives you a good amount of information about the creation of the new range of Nexus devices!

Google's Android has caught up with Apple's iOffering in terms of apps; there's now 700,000 apps on the Play Store!

Microsoft have faced criticism on the performance of Office 2013 on their new Surface RT tablets. The company went on to say that the “issue is known,” and “an update is forthcoming.” Apparently, the best way to 'fix the problem' is to update to the latest versions of all software which you have! Other users have said that has made everything better! So stay up to date!

The 4th generation iPad has been benchmarked and this one is a lot more powerful and it's packing a 1.4 GHz A6X chipset with 1GB of RAM!

The mobile phone makers Pantech have announced that they have partnered with Mocana to secure their next-gen Android smartphones and tablets! The company plans to use Mocana's VeloDAR solution which offers FIPS 140-2 certified encryption!

EE has today launched their 4G network and their new Fibre Optic home and business broadband service!

BBC iPlayer is now officially available for Sky+ viewers straight from your Sky Box!

ZTE has now officially overtaken HTC to become the world's 4th biggest smartphone manufacturer!

And finally, Rovio has offered their first video teaser of their upcoming Angry Birds Star Wars game! There's some game play in there too and it's looking pretty good! The full teaser is just below!

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